Good afternoon.

The time is now 5 01 p.m.

on Wednesday, September 3rd, 2025 in the City of San Antonio.

City Council public comment meeting is called to order.

Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Councilmember Corps.

Councilmember Castillo Anguiano.

Present.

Councilmember Via Gran.

Councilmember Mungia.

Councilmember Castillo.

Here.

Councilmember Galvan.

Councilmember Alderete Gabito.

Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez.

Councilmember Spears.

Councilmember White.

Mayor Jones.

Here.

Mayor, we have quorum.

Okay.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

This is a public hearing scheduled for today as well as the public comment, open forum.

We'll begin the meeting with a public hearing and then move on to public comment.

Speakers will be called in the order they signed up to speak, and the next speaker will be announced so speakers may begin to make their way to the podium.

Speakers will have two minutes.

Groups of three or more will be given six minutes.

If a speaker would like to cede their time to another speaker, they must notify the presiding officer prior to be getting their time as unused minutes are forfeited and cannot be seated.

Only speakers on the list may speak or cede their time, and written comment may be submitted to the city clerk.

The time is now 5 02 p.m.

and the combined public hearing for the budget and tax rate is now open.

Madam Clerk, please read the caption for the public hearing.

Great.

Ms.

Tate, over to you.

Good afternoon, Mayor and City Council.

My name is Jacina Tate.

I'm the budget director for the city of San Antonio.

And today I'll provide a brief presentation for the public hearing.

The purpose of today's public hearing is to obtain feedback from the public on the city's proposed property tax rate as well as the proposed budget proposed capital and operating budget.

Today's hearing is the first of two public hearings that we will hold.

The next one will be Thursday, September 11th.

Now these public hearings are in addition to the town halls that we've hosted.

We hosted 11 town halls throughout the city.

These were hosted after the budget was proposed on August 14th.

The fiscal year 2026 proposed budget is about $4 billion.

This is about 2.2% higher than fiscal year 2025.

This is made up of three major components, the first being our general fund at 1.69 billion dollars, and this is about a 1.6% increase over 2025.

The remaining components are capital budget at 1.1 billion dollars and restricted funds at 1.2 billion.

And these are funds that have a restricted source of revenue, so these revenues must be spent on a specific purpose.

The city's tax rate remains at 54.159 cents per 100 of valuation.

This is the 33rd consecutive year without an increase.

This is for exemptions to include homesteads, seniors, disabled persons, and child care provider.

It also includes a tax freeze for certain individuals.

One second, Ms.

Tate.

Um, are the slides coming up.

My apologies.

So uh just real quick to reiterate on the city's property tax rate.

Uh there is no property tax rate increase in the proposed budget.

It remains at 54.59 cents per 100 dollars in valuation.

And it does include uh the fiscal year 2026 proposed budget, does include property tax relief of about 152 million.

There are several rate and fee adjustments included in the proposed budget and have been presented as part of our budget presentations in accordance with the new state law which regulates food establishment fees.

I want to highlight the changes that are proposed in the in the budget uh and included um for our food establishment uh fee recommendations on December 1st, food establishment fees will be assessed based on gross volume of food sales rather than the number of employees.

These fee amounts are being recommended to partially recover the cost of providing food safety and inspection services to the community.

Now finally, as I mentioned, this is the first of two public hearings that we will hold.

The next public hearing will be on September 11th prior to the budget being adopted on August, I'm sorry, on September 18th.

That concludes my presentation.

Thank you so much.

We have two individuals that have signed up uh for to comment during public hearing.

Uh the first person is John Bachman, so you have two minutes.

Two.

John Bachman.

Okay.

Jack Finger, you have two minutes, sir.

Madam Mayor, other members of the city council, my name is Jack M.

Finger, and I wish to present you a few comments about your the budget and the and the tax rate and so forth.

You know, you keep saying you haven't uh raised the taxes in the 30 some odd years, but uh we the taxpayers know that put but we our experience has put the light of that and uh it has actually as you saw it actually goes up two or three percent this past year, even though uh you're still keeping our rates the the same.

You might at least put a token to it.

And if you really want to do it right, you give it to you lowered it as much as 10 percent to alleviate all the other ills that we have suffered over the years here.

But uh you had a 21 million dollar deficit.

I'm I'm glad to hear that you're trying to overcome that.

But I was gonna ask a public service.

I was going to offer some ideas on how you might uh decrease that that 21 and should shift the burden elsewhere.

Uh you know, you it a whole swath of the budget you could get rid of by just doing this, you know.

The um the the arts and culture department, this is from the 2425 budget, and you look at that, it says a total uh amount is about uh what is it 13 million?

You could re simply erase that whole budget.

It's 13 million you could shift to any of your pet projects there.

But uh I in one particular why do I say that?

Well, because one particular uh arts agency just really has has done some some things that we have uh over the years.

We're talking about the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center, and it's not the only one, but that does these things, but they've over the years they they've had uh oh talked about their various homosexual promotions and so forth, and you're gonna say, Jack, you homophobe, we we would actually give them more money for that.

But there's a real problem they had this year, even though I think you would would uh to take issue with.

Yeah, there it is.

The sex work, that's what they had just a couple of weeks ago.

Yeah.

Uh they they were promoting this.

No, no, I think uh you may want to to do something about that.

Also, another another big big uh place you may want to do it is the what is it, diversity equity inclusion.

Do you don't need it?

What person did they vote vote for mayor this year?

Well, I thank you.

Thank you.

Uh yes, thank you.

The combined second budget uh public hearing and second tax rate public hearing will be held on Thursday, September 11, 2025, which begins at 9 a.m.

in the council chamber.

The city council will formally consider and adopt the FY26 budget and vote on the proposed tax rate for tax year 2025 at this meeting on Thursday, September 18th, which begins at 9 a.m.

and will be held in the council chamber.

Having heard all comments from those persons wishing to speak on this item, the public hearing uh is now closed.

The time is 5 11 p.m.

We will now move on to public comment.

Uh public comments, an opportunity for members of the public to address the city council.